Santorum Cries When Asked About Son's Death, Calls Question A 'Cheap Shot'

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Santorum Cries When Asked About Son's Death, Calls Question A 'Cheap Shot'

ALTOONA, Iowa -- A large crowd gathered at the Pizza Ranch here waiting for Rick Santorum. At the last stop in Newton, he broke down and cried -- as did his wife -- discussing the death of their son.

The questioner did not seem openly hostile when asking about the Santorum family's decision to bring the deceased child home before burying him, but Santorum took umbrage at the question.

"We tried everything we could to save his life and we failed," Santorum said in response to a question at a local Pizza Ranch in Newton, according to the Washington Examiner. "He was delivered and he lived about two hours. He was delivered at about 3 o'clock in the morning and he lived and he died in our arms."

In an interview here with The Huffington Post, Santorum called the question about his late son in Newton a "cheap shot," but something he and his wife are used to. Santorum was recently criticized by a Fox News commentator for bringing the baby home.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/27/iowa-caucus-2012-live_n_1170077.html#174_santorum-cries-when-asked-about-sons-death-calls-question-a-cheap-shot

[undeterred]

1. It is a cheap shot. Why would somebody ask that?

[think]

2. Agree

[msongs]

5. Santorum has no problems with a war on iran that will kill unknown thousands but HIS

family deaths are special. ok

[karynnj]

22. Isn't that true for most people?

I know that you are anti-war, but wouldn't the death of a family member hit you harder than the all too frequent lost of life in Iraq and Afghanistan?

[Texasgal]

10. I agree..

As much distaste I have for him, the death of his newborn should not be an issue or a question.

Cheap and low.

[tammywammy]

11. Agreed n/t

[Octafish]

12. Agree.

Some subjects are private. Basic human kindness demands the family's grief be respected -- any family.

[TexasTowelie]

20. Agreed.

The topic isn't appropriate for ridicule.

[REP]

30. Because his wife had an abortion at 20 weeks to save her life

She went into labor at 20 weeks and delivered a fetus with defects incompatible with life (she had undergone inter uterine surgery to try to correct the fetal abnormality and had gone into sepsis from it, prompting the labor).

[proud2BlibKansan]

33. Because this baby was aborted

And Rick is adamantly anti-choice.

That's why.

[mucifer]

3. Plenty to criticize him on. His dead baby should be off limits.

[Initech]

18. Agreed actually.

[Gemini Cat]

19. I have to agree.

[Brickbat]

4. Who was the questioner?

Plant.

[cthulu2016]

8. sounds like a citizen at an event

[MarianJack]

6. I've detested little rickey santorum ever since he was elected to be my junior senator in 1994,...

...BUT, leave his deceased child out of it.

About the only remotely civilized things that the rethugs did in 2004 was to leave John Edwards' deceased son out of it (at least here in Maine). Asshole that he is, little rickey deserves the same.

There is WAY too much to attack him on policy and idoligically, to bring a dead baby into it. For the first time since hearing of little rickey in 1993, I agree with the little shit. Now I have to go take a shower.

PEACE!

[Sedona]

7. Sorry

but it's not normal to to drive a dead baby home to your three young children, kissing and cuddling and singing to Gabriel with his three siblings, ages 6, 4 and 1 1/2. kiss it and sleep with the dead body all night. He subjected his own children to the trauma of seeing and…interacting…with a dead baby’s body.

That's just fucking sick and it's about time someone called him out on it.

[mucifer]

9. How do you know the kids were traumatized?

[krispos42]

29. Let's put it this way...

...if Child Protective Services had intervened, removed the living children from the home, and investigated what else the Santorums had done, would you have been surprised?

[proud2BlibKansan]

37. How do you know they WEREN'T ??

This is not only sick, it's child abuse.

[cthulu2016]

13. Bull... Do these kids look traumatized to you?

(This is meant as a joke. I am not disagreeing with you.)

[Merlot]

16. Yes, they do, actually.

oh, just saw your "joking"

[Merlot]

14. Agreed. They're talking about the behavior of the parents.

Which is weird beyond belief if they did what you're saying. I haven't heard the story.

And yes, subjecting young children to their dead sibling is tramatizing if done in the manner described.

[Texasgal]

21. Really?

What do you think about Islamic rituals of washing the body before being shrouded?

Tibet monks chops the body and rolls the pieces in flour to be fed to the scavanging birds?

Some people burn their loved ones and make them into diamond rings?

I mean, it's not our business. I can't stand the fucker but the issue of how he treated his infants death should be off limits. It's not my business to judge how that family dealt with grief.

[mucifer]

24. thank you! And a baby who lived for 2 hours is a baby who lived for 2 hours, not a fetus.

[REP]

34. 20 weeks gestation is a second-trimester fetus

Calling it a bun in the oven doesn't make it pastry, either. Words matter.

[proud2BlibKansan]

39. It was an aborted fetus, not a full term baby

[proud2BlibKansan]

38. Are children involved in any of those rituals?

If adults want to take a dead baby home and 'bond' with it, fine. But making children kiss it and bond with it is fucking sick.

[Zalatix]

45. Thanks! I've been waffling over this issue for a while.

But your examples of how people mourn the dead did it for me.

Santorum is a turd.

[REP]

31. It was a 20-week fetus, not a full-term stillborn infant.

[proud2BlibKansan]

36. +1

[emilyg]

51. Were you there? They brought

the baby home to bury it.

[Sedona]

52. wrong

they brought the 20 week fetus back to the hospital after the play date/sleepover

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Santorum#Personal_life

[emilyg]

53. Their business - their choices.

[Sedona]

54. Hopefully this sick fuck won't be making choices for the 99%

come January 2013. It needed to be well known. I'm glad it finally happened.

[Nye Bevan]

15. Wow. I never thought I would feel any kind of empathy for Santorum. Ever.

But this line of questioning makes me feel bad for him. I don't care who the candidate is, leave their dead kids out of it.

[Angry Dragon]

17. It is my understanding that the baby was taken out

because it was killing his wife


http://www.cagle.com/2011/06/rick-santorum-when-the-anti-choice-choose/

[Ms. Toad]

28. Not quite.

Their child had a urinary tract defect (fetal urinary tract defects are often fatal - I am not familiar with the severity of this particular one ). They attempted to fix it surgically, and she ended up with an infection. Karen Santorum went into labor early, and requested that the doctors give her something to halt labor but they refused.

Both of the Santorums did say that if it came down to a choice between her and their son, they would have induced labor - which at 16 weeks - would almost certainly have ended with the death of their child.

articles.philly.com/1997-05-04/news/25562508_1_fetal-abnormality-controversial-late-term-abortion-procedure-intact-dilation-and-extraction

[Angry Dragon]

32. The article I linked to

stated 19-20 weeks and the doctors induced labor to save her life

[REP]

35. Yup. Her abortion is different, though. Other women can damn well die.

Fuck them both.

[Ms. Toad]

46. I don't agree with his position -

or his (lack of) consistency.

But, it is important be accurate in our allegations.

I have not seen anything other than recent articles containing unattributed assertions that labor was induced, and most seem to be inaccurate regurgitations of the contemporaneous Philadelphia Inquirer article I linked to - which says the labor was not induced. (In which they admit they would have induced labor, had it been necessary to save her life.)

[REP]

47. Either way, saving her life is okay. Other women can die.

[Ms. Toad]

50. That seems to be his position. n/t

[Ms. Toad]

44. It is a commentary written in 2011 about an event that happened in 1996.

without any attribution to the source of its information.

The 1997 article I linked to in the Philadelphia Inquirer (a reputable, large circulation newspaper which has won a number of Pulitzer prizes) is based on an interview done with the Santorums within a few months of the event, in which they admit that they would have chosen to induce labor if it came down to a question between Karen's life and that of the child she was carrying, but they were not forced to make that choice because she went into labor spontaneously.

The PI article is a bit more reliable than the one you linked to.

[femmocrat]

23. How would people even know about this, unless Santorum had spoken publicly about it in the past?

I don't know the history of this sad story, but it seems to me that Santorum himself must have told the story originally. Why would he take such a private moment and make it public? Who knows?!

He seems to be the one who started all of this.... now he wants it to be off-limits? I'm sorry for the family, but this story has been out there for a long time. People do seem to find it weirdly fascinating. Asking about it is impolite and insensitive, but not necessarily a "cheap shot", IMO.

[mucifer]

25. I actually think it's an important discussion about how people grieve and how siblings can be a part

of it.

[undeterred]

27. Thank you.

Its essentially a private matter which he apparently chose to make public. That still doesn't make it something which it is appropriate for us to judge him for.

[proud2BlibKansan]

40. He wrote about it in his book

[Sedona]

42. Not only did they go pubic, they CA$HED IN

http://www.amazon.com/Letters-Gabriel-Karen-Garver-Santorum/dp/1568145284/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1325562987&sr=1-2

The book is a series of letters that Karen wrote to her son, Gabriel Michael, who was born prematurely and died two hours after birth. Karen expresses the bond between mother and child with incredible tenderness and love. Through her lived experience and deep faith, Karen makes a bold and profound statement about the gift of life, family values, the bond between parent and child, the grieving process and the paradox of suffering. What began as a normal pregnancy for Karen ended with serious difficulties just as her husband Rick Santorum (Republican - Pennsylvania) was leading the charge against partial birth abortion in the U.S. Senate.

[Quantess]

26. He was right to defend himself that way,

and I have the right to think he did something pretty twisted, by bringing home dead fetus to cradle.

But wasn't he the one who talked it about publicly, who brought it up himself, long ago?

[OhioBlue]

41. The article doesn't give the exact question

I agree with others that we can respect the family's decision on how to grieve.

I would however like to hear a question posed to him on how he can justify his absolute non-choice stance knowing that his family had to make a choice to save the life of his wife. Nothing is black and white and we should never pass straight up bans of medical procedures that save women's lives. He and his wife should know this and stop pretending like the right to lifers/anti-choicers are right. Regulations, education, etc are fine - but bans are wrong. trust women.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

43. Does anybody think that this might have been a ploy for sympathy

right in advance of the Iowa caucuses (and right when he's surging no less)? I hesitate to ask b/c I don't want to begrudge the guy and his family what is surely very real grief over their dead child nor do I want to make light of it by any means but the conspiracy theorist in me wonders about the timing of this and who exactly would choose to bring it up. This isn't new news either. I think some other posters here raised some good points about the connection of what happened to his rigidly anti-choice views that he demands for others.

[Douglas Carpenter]

48. sounds a bit odd to me - but that is the least of my concerns about Rick Santorum

[pennylane100]

49. How dare he think that he should not be subjected to "cheap shots" about events in his own life.

His crusade against the rights of gays and women alone would make him fair game. He has not problem supporting the wars that are killing thousands of innocent people in Iraq and Afghanistan. I find him to be one of the most contemptible politicians out there, and that is a really low threshold to meet. He deserves all the cheap shots he gets and more.